


We Still Haven't Talked

by paletigerswrites



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Multi, Spoilers for Post timeskip Attack on titan, Strained Friendships, Timeskip, bc it would clog up search results and i want this to just be about jean and marco, childhood friends to ex friends to friends to lovers LOL, college parties galore, first year in college shenanigans, floch hate, kind of spoilers, theres other couples but i didnt tag them
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:00:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25559227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paletigerswrites/pseuds/paletigerswrites
Summary: AU! In which Jean and Marco are childhood best friends until one day their friendship ends abruptly. After four years, they're now in college, and just so happen to be roommates.
Relationships: Marco Bott/Jean Kirstein
Comments: 3
Kudos: 7





	1. The Demon on My Shoulder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean wakes up to a surprising email. His first year in college is starting off strong.

Something about being alone at night with my thoughts brings a certain freckled face to mind; one I’m not sure if I’m allowed to think about anymore.

Lying awake at night is the one consistent thing in my life. It’s too hard to fall asleep when my thoughts are always so clogged up, always overthinking just about every conversation I’ve been an active participant in over the last nineteen years.

It’s like I can’t breathe or think without feeling like I’ve done something wrong. Well, I  _ have  _ done a lot of things wrong, too many to count on one hand.

I don’t know if I’m a bad person or not. Sure, I argue and fight with my friends occasionally, most of the things we yell at each other is just teasing. But thinking back to the times when the words I had said were serious, hateful, spiteful… 

It all comes back to Marco.

And I hate myself for it.

I can’t seem to get him out of my head, no matter how hard I try to do so. His stupid tanned skin and go lucky attitude seems to always send me into a bad mood.

I hate how much I think of him on a given day. It’s like he’s the demon on my shoulder, constantly reminding me about how awful I am.

He’s constantly poking the most sensitive parts of my brain. He creates an itch I can’t scratch or relieve. 

My brain has reduced the image of the most kind hearted person I’ve ever met into an amalgamation of hated and self loathing.

Marco isn’t like that at all. 

He’s the most amazing person I’ve ever known.

Never once has Marco gone out of his way to make me feel like shit. I could believe he’s never done anyone wrong in his life. 

He’s always been the one to step in and help someone who needs it. It’s like he could never stop and think for himself, he was never too late to rush in and fix someone else’s problem.

Sometimes I wonder if we were friends because he took pity on me.

I could sit and wonder why my brain has turned him into this. But I know why.

* * *

You know, it wasn’t always like this. Avoiding thinking of him, avoiding saying his name. 

It’s like if I say his name, he’ll appear like Beetlejuice. Or Bloody Mary. As the saying goes, speak of the devil and he shall appear.

He used to keep me awake in other ways. Staying up all night because I knew I would be hanging out with him the next day, thinking about how happy he made me. 

Thinking about his warm presence next to me.

Or how my eyes would wander down only to catch at his lips.

He would just stare at me with his eyes wide, like a deer in headlights.

I wonder how… Marco would think of me.

What- 

What am I even saying? 

He was just my best friend. 

_ “You only care about yourself, Jean! You never fucking think about how I feel! Why would you even say that?” _

Remembering this makes me feel sick.

_ “I HATE you!” _

I attempt to rub the grogginess out of my eyes. Thinking about that will only make me less likely to get decent sleep. 

I vigorously rub my hands up and down my face in an attempt to stop thinking. 

My hands wonder to cover my ears, and just maybe I’ll delusionally stop hearing the endless voices in my head.. It’s an empty attempt to ignore everything. 

I close my eyes, and try to unfurrow my eyebrows. 

Maybe if I just lay here, it’ll go away.

* * *

  
  


The loudest goddamn noise makes my eyes shoot open.

My phone vibrates and chirps with the sound of my alarm echoing throughout my room. 

I curse as I fumble for my phone hiding under my sheets, praying I find it before my alarm gives me a headache.

It takes a couple of tries to fully turn the alarm off. I find it by my feet and turn the volume off.

Fully sitting up, I strain to open my eyes, taking in the light pouring through my small room. 

Seeing my room so empty feels wrong. My posters have been taken down and carefully tucked away into storage bins along with everything else.

My fragile polaroids of my friends secured somewhere among the rest. I never considered myself so sentimental until I fully looked at what I kept throughout the years. 

It’s kind of embarrassing to see most of my room is just memories of my friends. Maybe memories I’ll be the only one to remember. Which is fine.

I take a moment to yawn and stretch before checking my phone, aching to get rid of the stiffness in my neck. 

I open my phone to see over twenty discord notifications from the groupchat. They’re always up talking until the crack of dawn. I’m never on my phone late enough to catch them when they’re online.

I scroll back to last night to go over what was said while I was asleep.

**(3:00AM) Armin:** Do you guys have everything ready?

**(3:03AM) Connie:** uhh.. short answer yes

**(3:06AM) Armin:** I assume you have little to nothing packed.

**(3:10AM) Connie:** hey!!! stop being an ass. even if youre right

**(3:10AM) Sasha:** lolololol

**(3:11AM) Connie:** sasha shut UP you don’t have anything packed either

**(3:25AM) Eren:** It would have helped if you guys packed a week beforehand BUT yknow.

**(10:30AM) Ymir:** Didn’t Mikasa pack all your shit for you Yaeger? And you’re the one talking? 

**(10:32AM) Mikasa:** To be fair, he packed more than I thought he would.

**(10:41AM) Eren:** You are NOT helping my case

**(10:42AM) Armin:** … Anyway did you guys check your emails to see who you’re rooming with? I know Eren, Mikasa, and I all signed up to be roomed together so we’ll have a mystery fourth person.

**(10:45AM) Sasha:** I forgot!!!! we’re getting a mystery 4th 2!!

Right. Totally forgot about that. 

Originally, I was going to room with Eren. Armin and Mikasa didn’t want to deal with our constant fights no matter how close we’ve become. 

Which is understandable. We love to piss each other off. So now, Connie, Sasha and I are together. I love dicking around with them, so any roommate situation would have been a win-win.

I change my tabs on my phone to look through my email. Universities tend to bombard you with annoying nonsense emails right before school starts up, so I haven’t been checking for an update to our roommate situation.

I just hope the fourth person isn’t Floch, or something. I should have gotten a restraining order against that asshole.

“Housing. ‘We are excited to see you this fall’ blah blah. Let’s see…” I read off the email to myself as I further scroll down. The email contains the dates and assigned times students are allowed to move into the residence halls, so pretty ordinary information.

I scroll past the highlighted text to the grid containing the names of roommates. Everything is either bolded, highlighted, in bright red text. It’s straining on my eyes.  
“Cool. Connie Springer, Sasha Blouse, myself, and… what?” 

The fourth name catches me off guard. Maybe staying up last night fucked up my vision. I rub my eyes aggressively with my non dominant hand. I return to the email.

“No… No fucking way.” My chest tightens. 

Is life playing some sort of fucked up game with my emotions? 

No way this is real. My hands tremble as I screenshot the email.

**(10:50AM) Connie:** lets just hope we dont get a weirdo. jeannie boy is enough as it is lolol

**(10:55AM) Jean:** before i even get into this i hate you also

**(11:00AM) Jean: (Image sent)** you gotta be fucking kidding me with this right now fucking look at this

**(11:01AM) Eren:** NO fucking way absolutely no way

**(11:10AM) Armin:** I mean… To be fair, we live on an island, so choices for universities are limited, but for him to be rooming with you is kind of crazy. 

**(11:11AM) Jean:** i SWEAR its like the universe has it out for my throat. i need a minute

I look away from my phone to stare at the wall in front of me. 

Acid fills the back of my throat. 

We’re even paired to live in the same room together. 

Marco Bodt. 

The reactions from Eren and Armin are real. I wasn’t imagining his name in that fourth spot. It wasn’t from last night’s thoughts. 

Marco and I are going to be living together. 

My heart pounds in my head. Will he request to be moved? Will he even look at me? Will I be able to look at him in the eyes? Will he be… happy to see me? 

My face feels hot.

Why am I burning up? My room is freezing cold.

“Jeanny! You have to leave in less than an hour so you’ll arrive on time! You need to get up!” My Mother’s voice echoes loudly through my door. 

I’ll have plenty of time to decide to chicken out of talking to Marco on the way to school.

I get out of bed and take out the clothes from my backpack laying at the foot of my bed. 

The last bit of my things are in this backpack, and everything else is in my shitty van. I quickly change into the clothes I set aside last night. 

A black button down long sleeved shirt, black pants, and a bomber jacket. I put my dirty clothes into my bag, and put my phone into the side pocket of my bag and head for the door.

I take a final look at my room. Too many things have made me feel awful this morning.

“I’m glad I didn’t have to go up there and shake you awake. You know I won’t be there to do that once you’re actually at college, right?” My Mother sighs into her coffee.

I match her sigh. I’ll never know what this woman is thinking. 

“Yeah. Guess you’re glad you won’t have to see me every morning.” I say with slight disappointment. She raises a brow and frowns.  
“I’ll miss you Jean. Stop being such a downer. It’s a big day today, don’t start it off so shittily.” She says with a smirk. I know where I get my attitude, at least. 

I smile slightly and walk over to the front door. I don’t want to get emotional before I get in the car. Seeing my Mother sad will just make me further crash and burn.

She waves as I walk myself outside. 

The morning is bright and vibrant. It’s the end of July with August right around the corner. The school usually would have moved us in later, but turns out they wanted a huge campus wide welcoming party for the incoming freshman, so we’re moving in earlier.

Thinking about parties makes me shiver. I used to love going to parties.

I walk over to my car and get inside. 

I set my bag on the passenger seat floor and retrieve my phone out of its pocket. I adjust my rear view mirror before I buckle myself. I pull up my GPS and set in the address to the university.

I check my messages again. I notice a private message from Armin.

**Armin:** Hey Jean, are you going to be okay? I know you two didn’t leave off on best terms... 

I sigh at the message. I wish everyone didn’t know about my relationships even though I constantly bring them up.

**Jean:** Yeah i think i will be. Plus i have a car ride to think over what ill say. Just tryin not to freak out.

**Armin:** That’s a good idea. I know you’ll be able to talk about it with Eren if you need to. We’re here for you Jean.

I put down my phone and hold onto the steering wheel.

Fuck! I forgot Eren would be carpooling with me. 

I even forgot half the shit in this car is his anyway. 

I sigh as I put the car into reverse and begin my trek to Eren’s house. This day is going to be headache inducing.

* * *

  
  


Eren is already standing in his driveway by the time I pull up. His long chestnut hair unruly from sleep. 

You can really tell he just woke up twenty minutes ago from how he’s dressed, his dark green pullover hoodie and tan khakis he always wears are crinkled and messy; only one pant leg is rolled up. 

As long as I’ve known Eren, he’s always been a mess. He either cares too much about his appearance, or not at all. There is no in between. 

As a kid, he never took his looks into consideration. Mikasa was always doting on him and fixing him up. All these years later, he finally realizes he’s somewhat of an attractive guy.

I can see why girls fall for him. If he weren’t such an asshole, I’d-

I’m getting off track.

This boy is a mess.

The expression on his face is one of pure shock and confusion, practically clutching his phone and backpack in one hand.

He runs to the passenger side of my car and flings the door open. In a rush to know everything and disregarding my fucking car in the process.

“You’re telling me you JUST NOW found out that MARCO of ALL people is going to be your FUCKING ROOMMATE?” He screams as he jumps into the car and slams the door.

I wince at the volume and rub my temples with my fingers. So loud. When is Eren ever quiet?

“Fucking Jesus Yaeger, dial down the volume? And yeah, I’m fucking flabberghasted.” I say sarcastically, shoulders tensing up just the slightest. 

Eren moves his bag onto his lap and holds it. He flips down the car’s mirror and examines himself. 

See what I said? Either too concerned or not at all.

He pulls his shoulder length hair into his hands and begins to tie it with a rubber band. He picks and prods at his chin hair. I would have never considered Eren the type to want long hair and a slight beard. 

It’s the beginnings of a beard, at least. His body usually looks like a wax figurine from how hairless he is. I’m surprised he can even grow facial hair in the first place.

“I can’t believe this shit Jean. How long has it been?” Eren says a bit dialed down with a slight frown on his face. He looks away from the mirror and our eyes connect.

Embarrassed that I was staring, I turn to face the steering wheel.

“God, four years. It feels like an eternity, though.” I say as I reverse out of his driveway and head towards the interstate. The GPS begins to reroute in the background.

Four years since I had last spoken to Marco. It’s like he had fallen off of the face of the Earth. To him, it probably felt the same.

At least, I hope so.

I wonder how much he’s changed. I wonder what he’s been through.

My heart begins to ache. 

“Do you want to go over the endless possibilities of what you might say and how you might fuck up?” He says, promptly smacking the mirror back up. I sigh and push his shoulder.

Ah. Playful, almost hurtful banter. He always knows how to make me feel better while also breaking my spirits.

“Would you be more respectful to my car? I know it’s shit but you’re a bit fucking agressive already today,” I say, slightly smiling. Eren smirks back. 

“Sorry. But seriously, what are you going to say?” He rests his arm on the window, face resting against the palm of his hand.

I bite my lip and stare at the road. Deeply inhaling, I turn on my blinker and shift lanes. 

“I don’t know. I think he still hates me. I really don’t want to confront him.” The car slightly bumps from the shift from road to bridge, connecting the Shiganshina District to Trost. 

Eren crosses his legs and pulls out his phone.

I assume he’s texting Armin about the situation. Or playing some stupid game.

“I’m sure you’ll think of something. Hell, you might not even have to say anything at all. Plus, I don’t think he really hates you… Just think about it, Marco? Hating someone? Yeah, right.” Eren rolls his eyes as he plays with his phone.

I sigh and ruffle my hair, steering with my leg for a moment. 

I’m just glad I’m not the only who thinks that. It makes me feel like I stand a chance.

“I know… All that shit with Reiner and Marco still forgives him. It’s different though… We were best friends, Eren. And I said that awful shit to him. It’s not like he could just not move away.” 

I chew at my lip. One too many sad as shit things to think about at once.

“Just go in and not think about it. I know it’s hard for your horse face not to do that, but you’re an adult now. You gotta be responsible for the shit you said.” Eren stifles a laugh at the horse face comment.

I fucking hate this kid sometimes. I smack his phone out of his hand and return to the wheel.

“Fuck off Jean!” He laughs and grabs his phone. I laugh a bit. 

The car grows silent as Eren’s words burrow into my head. Owning up to my actions has never been my strong suit. 

Getting out of situations with lies that end up so complicated that it starts messing with my reality? That’s usually more my speed. 

I hate to admit it.

As I maneuver through traffic, the words go deeper into my head. 

I try not to think about him, but the filter in my brain just turns off.

Marco and I have known each other since elementary school. 

Growing up, I didn’t really have many friends.

I was usually surrounded by kids in the neighborhood forced to talk to me by their parents. Getting pushed around by the older kids and verbally harassed by my peers at school didn’t help either.

Being made fun of for my weight or getting pushed around by Yaeger of all people made me not want to try to be friends with anyone. 

As a kid, I started putting up walls to stop myself from being hurt.

Even now, I still unconsciously do it. Avoid crying around people. 

You’ll be weak, a target.

Don’t let anyone too close.

Because-

They’ll just end up like the last thing I fucked up.

But Marco… He’s just nice to everyone.

He’s this different kind of nice, not out to get anything in return or expecting things from you. Just a kind smile adorned with freckles.

Freckles, freckles, freckles. He hated them. The older kids would pick on him just for having an abundance of those freckles everywhere.

I liked them. I think seeing him so upset when looking in the mirror just made me fixate on them more and more.

I wanted him to know they weren’t ugly. And that I thought they were special.

I don’t know why I would get so embarrassed when he would smile at me and say, 

_ “You really like them?” _

But, he never got mad at the kids who made fun of him.

He was always like that. 

No matter what happened to him he just took it in stride. 

Always smiling, always there for me.

* * *

_ “Hey… You’re John, right?” _

_ A small voice speaks over me. I lift my head from my crossed arms to find a kid with a black bowl cut. He looks like one of those older kids. _

_ “I-It’s Jean.” I correct him from my spot on the floor. His eyes widen and he itches his ear. _

_ “Sorr-y. Didn’t mean to say it wrong. I’m Marco.” He sits with me from my spot against the brick walls of the school. _

_ I move away from him a bit. _

_ “Whatdya want? Are you gonna throw your lunch at me?” I accuse him. His hands defensively raise. _

_ “No!” He shouts. This kid seems easy to tease. _

_ I look at him up and down. He uncomfortably shifts in weight. I see him gettin’ picked on too, sometimes. _

_ “I wanted to sit with you, you seem lonely.” He says as he begins to hold his knees to his chest. _

_ I nod, confirming that yeah, I am pretty lonely. It’s not that hard to tell. _

_ “We can be friends. I-If you wanna.” Marco starts to fluster.  _

_ “I’d like that.” I smile at him. He returns the favor, smiling ear to ear. _

* * *

“Oi, Jean. We’re here. Everyone in the chat is waiting in the dorm parking lot. Connie and Sasha have been freaking out for the last half hour. Historia even replied.” Eren says slightly shaking me out of my memory. 

Noticing we’ve arrived, I internally smack myself at dissociating while driving. At least we made it with no accidents, not including the accident that will happen within the next two hours. 

Why did I have to think of that right now? I just imagine demon-on-my-shoulder Marco is having so much fun right now.

Arriving on campus is a breath of fresh air. I roll down the windows to take in the university streets.

Everything is head to toe decorated in school spirit crap, like the Titan mascot took a shit everywhere. It’s sickening, but in a good way?

The sheer size of the campus immediately blows me away. I didn’t remember the tour catching me off guard like this. Individual buildings for STEM, art, engineering… truly an all in one campus. Gotta get what you can get on an island, I guess.

Eren turns off the GPS and begins to lead me to the parking spots with directions via Armin in the discord. Thank god for that kid. I just know I’ll be having a hard time finding my way through this school on my own later.

I look around for the group and a spot to park in. Luckily, I see some jumping bodies wave down my car and point to a spot across from them. 

Nice of everybody to save me a spot to park in this fucking mess. The group moves out of our way as I park, Eren bursting out of the seams ready to get out of the car and stretch. 

He opens the door and all I hear is muffled screaming coming from Connie and Sasha. 

Eren screams his greetings back and runs to hug Armin and Mikasa.

His face immediately goes from exhausted to energetic in less than a second. Seeing his best friends giving him energy is so heartwarming I could gag.

But seeing the group makes me feel the same way. I let myself smile.

I unbuckle and exit the car.

“Jean!!! We missed you!” Sasha yells as she bear hugs me. I return the hug and pat her on the top of her head. She smiles brightly up towards me. As she lets go, Historia and Ymir make their way closer to my car and the rest of the group.

“I’m barely out of the car yet, Sasha. How has everyone been?” I ask, looking around at everyone. From what I notice, Reiner, Bertholdt, and Annie aren’t here but they’re usually the exceptions to the group.

Connie, now at my side, clasps my shoulder. 

“Dude, what are you going to do? Sasha and I are already moved in, but we didn’t see Marco yet.” His eyes are a bit wide with concern, but mostly from the excitement from seeing everyone.

And reality wants to hit me hard. I start panicking internally.

I fidget with my shirt sleeve.

“I still don’t know. I’m just going to move in and not think about it that much. I’ll get to it when I get to it.” I say placing a hand on my hip and pulling at the hair on my head anxiously.

I didn’t even notice how long my own hair had gotten.

Connie smacks my hand out of my hair.

“Dude, you’re gonna go bald if you keep doing that.” He doesn’t know he just set himself up.

“Haaah? You got a lot of guts down there talking like that. What, are you stupid? You’re fucking already bald!” I say as I smack him upside the head. 

Ah. There’s the old Jean. 

“Ow, you fucking asshole!” Connie explaims, rubbing the spot I smacked with his hands. He smirks and goes to kick my shins.

“God damn it!” I shout, stumbling a bit. Some laughter catches me off guard. The rest of the group is stifling their laughter at the sight of Connie and I fighting each other.

Armin covers his mouth with his hands, tears forming at the corners of his eyes from laughing so hard. I smile at the sight. Connie laughs with them, but gets his revenge with another final blow to my shoulder.

I wince. Deserved it.

“Whatever, I have to unpack. Does anyone want to help?” I cross my arms indignantly, and jokingly, of course. Mikasa and Armin raise their hands.

This is great. Mikasa can carry three bins just on her own. I still don’t know how she’s so strong.

“I’ll help.” Mikasa says with the slightest smile. So slight you just might miss it. Eren gasps loudly. 

Here we go.

“Huh?! You guys aren’t going to help me? You’re fucking helping horse face?” Eren’s face is pure betrayal to the point of over exaggeration. 

Armin runs a hand through his short undercut. He sighs. 

Ymir rests her entire weight onto Eren’s head. 

“I mean, Mikasa basically packed for you. I feel like I shouldn’t have to remind you of that.” Ymir speaks up. 

Her and Historia have been silently chatting amongst themselves amongst all the chaos. Of course she speaks up to put Eren down. 

That’s why we get along, our mutual bond of making Eren mad.

I laugh and point in Eren’s face.

“Have fun unpacking alone, moron.” Eren gasps, clutching his non-existent pearls. 

“What the fuck did you call me?” He rolls up his sweatshirt sleeves, pretending to get ready to fist fight me.

I laugh and stick out my tongue at him as I open the trunk to my van. Armin sighs as he and Mikasa grab some of my storage bins.

I follow suit. After grabbing my own bin, I leave the trunk open for Eren. 

“Make sure you close the trunk when you’re finished getting your stuff out, Yaeger.” I say to Eren as we walk towards the dorms. 

A faint “Yeah, okay” from Eren and we begin our walk to the residence halls.

This building is massive. Absolutely fucking massive. And Marco just so happens to end up in my room? A fucking conspiracy is being played against me. 

We politely wade through the crowd of freshman and returning students, and make our way to the lobby. I look for that freckled face in the crowd. 

I really don’t want him to catch me with my pants down. Metaphorically speaking, that is. 

Fuck.

Mikasa speaks up, leaning towards Armin and I so she doesn’t have to raise her voice.

“Which floor?” She says. I perk up and set down the bin.

“Oh, second, all the way at the end I assume. 250 should be towards the end of the hallway on the second floor.” I grab my keys from my pocket and place them on top of the bin, picking it up again.

She nods and we head to the elevator, clicking the button to the second floor.

Armin yawns and Mikasa shifts her weight besides me. The elevator dings and opens, no one inside. 

_ Thank god _ . I click the second floor button and Mikasa leans into my shoulder.

“You doing okay?” she whispers. I smile at her concern, flustering a bit. It’s not odd for Mikasa to ask, but it’s nice to know she cares. She’s usually just worried about Eren all the time.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’m sure I’m just anxious and overreacting.” I reply, bumping my shoulder into hers. 

She slightly smiles in that reserved way of hers, and returns to her place. That’s the end of that, I guess. 

The elevator dings and the doors open to people waiting on the outside of the doors. In a frantic, I focus my line of sight on my bin instead of any faces.

I excuse myself out of their way, walking past them. 

We walk out into the second floor lobby and make our way towards my dorm room.

I let my feet guide me to the end, not picking up my head the entire way there.

All of a sudden, my face meets the front of the door. 

I set down the storage bin and fumble with my keys.

“Do you want me to get the door for you?” Mikasa perks up. I nod and she takes the keys from my hands. I step out of her way and stumble from tripping myself on the box I literally JUST set down. 

This is not going well. 

The door opens to my new residence for the next ten months. Mikasa walks into the door, Armin behind her. I go to pick up the bin.

“No one’s in here, Jean! He hasn’t arrived yet, I assume.” Armin’s voice calls out from inside the room. 

I walk inside and inspect the area

. The dorm’s opening is a small, long common room. A small table with two chairs rests to my left, and the kitchen portion of the dorm to the left. The dorm opens up in front of me, a small hallway leading to two rooms to the left and right.

Sasha and Connie have already claimed the left room from what it seems, a whiteboard stuck to the closed door with messy handwriting that reads, “Bad Bitches Only! No Horses Allowed!” 

I frown slightly and sigh. I don’t think my face is THAT long. Eren and his stupid nicknames for me. 

That one is one that still kind of hurts my feelings. Eren used to kick me and call me that.

I shake my head. Stop being such a fucking downer! Just move your stuff and be an annoying emo ass later.

I bring myself and my bin into the room to the right. The room is so empty and sterile, unlived in and sickly clean, if that makes sense. 

Mikasa and Armin set the bins on the bed closest to the door, already claiming it as my space. 

Which is fine. I don’t care either way. 

I set down my bin on the bed as well. 

This is going to be a long day of moving and unpacking.

* * *

  
  


From the time we left Shiganshina in the afternoon, it had been about three hours of moving and unpacking. When we had finished moving my things into my room, we locked up to go help Eren with his things.

Ymir and Historia had helped quite a bit with his move, so we came to help finish the rest. Which wasn’t much. Just an excuse to get Eren off track moving his shit in. 

We all congregate in the third floor lobby after finishing moving his stuff into the dorm.

“So we’ll all meet up at seven-ish to go get dinner, right?” Eren announces. We all nod our heads in agreement. 

“That gives us enough time to unpack, so don’t go slacking off!” Historia says scoldingly mainly towards Connie and Sasha. They both, for a second, look like they’re about to counterpoint. 

They decide not to, too tired from the day’s events.

We all split off to our different ways to return back to our respective dorms. 

Connie, Sasha and I walk down the hallway towards the staircase, quietly commenting about how collectively tired we all are. 

We make it to our door, and Connie pulls out his key to unlock it. 

They go into their rooms and close the door behind them. 

I close the door to the dorm and lock it from the inside.

Today, in the most simplest terms, has been a terrible, no good, very bad day. It was only three in the afternoon and I was already so fucking tired.

I just want to take the longest nap on my bare cold mattress. Unpacking can wait until later. I need a nap.

I sluggishly open the door to my room looking downward, and hear a gasp. 

Everything feels like it’s in slow motion. At first, I assume the gasp has come from Connie or Sasha, so I go to look behind me. 

I look up, see a figure, then I look behind me. It’s like my brain failed to register the whole ass man in my dorm room.

I doubletake at least five times.

At first I refuse to believe it’s him. My brain only remembers the slightly taller, round faced, sixteen year old Marco.

This… He’s incredibly different. His face is slimmer, his hair is a bit less put together. Instead of a bowl cut, it’s a fade. It suits him. 

He’s more buff. Wow. He is actually really buff. His black short sleeves are rolled up as far as they can go. Like he could flex slightly and his shirt might rip. I think I might be over exaggerating.

This is not the time. Wow this really is not the time.

It’s Marco.

He’s in front of me.

“Jean?” His deeper voice cuts my train of thought.

My eyes are wide and I’m slack jawed. I’m the deer in the headlights now.

  
“Holy fuck.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	2. Painkiller

adding this chapter so i can title each chapter pls forgive me

**Author's Note:**

> All rewritten! Let me know what you think! I forgot to save my big monologue about how AOT has changed my life over the 8 years I've been into it LOLOL   
> I'll rewrite it later. its currently 3 am. xoxox


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